1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a mechanism for reversing the front face (hereinafter "face") and back face (hereinafter "back") of each of a plurality of sheets to permit the sheets to have the same faces or backs in the same direction for use in a device for treating the sheets such as, for example, bank notes.
2. Description of the Prior Art
A banking organ such as a bank profitably employs an apparatus for automatically treating bank notes for elimination or reduction of labor. For example, an automatic bank note depositing and dispensing machine is known to automatically deposit and dispense a bank note when operated by a customer.
A circulatory bank note depositing and dispensing machine begins to be put into practical use among machines of the type in recent years for effectively turning money and saving operators much time and labor to be expensed for replenishing and withdrawing bank notes, in which received bank notes by deposition are reusable for payment.
The circulatory bank note depositing and dispensing machine distinguishes bank notes decided to be genuine among deposited bank notes, into those to be reused and those to be rejected, and profitably employs the bank notes to be reused for payment.
A customer then receives bank notes put in order to be the same in the faces and backs thereof from the circulatory bank note depositing and dispensing machine to facilitate his confirmation of the amount of the bank notes.
However, bank notes deposited by a customer are not necessarily unified in the faces and backs thereof, but rather, are often irregular.
Thus, the circulatory bank note depositing and dispensing machine has a face and back reversing mechanism for unifying the faces and backs of bank notes deposited by a customer.
Such a face and back reversing mechanism is adapted up to now to convey bank notes having the faces and backs previously unified in the same direction to the next process through a bypassing passage as they are conveyed, while bank notes conveyed with in their faces and backs reversed are led to a face and back reversing passage by making use of a blade.
The face and back reversing passage forces the bank notes to U-turn on their way for reversing the faces and backs thereof, and thus to be conveyed in a reversed relation in the front and back ends thereof and to join the bypassing passage.
The arrangement for reversing the face and back of a bank note by making use of a U-turn thereof as described above can not accept the succeeding bank note until the preceding bank note passes through the U-turn passage after entering therein, and thus needs an interval between the preceding and succeeding bank notes by at least a bank note travelling distance corresponding to the passing time required by the bank note to get through the U-turn passage from the inlet end to the outlet end thereof. The interval causes a rate for treating the bank notes to be delayed.
Accordingly, provided that the face and back reversing passage has the U-turn passage, the bank note travelling distance and the time required for passage therethrough are substantially increased. This not only decreases the speed for treating a bank note arranged reversely with respect to the face and back thereof, but also that for treating the bank note arranged properly in the face and back thereof since the length of the bypass passage is specified depending on the bank note travelling distance and time. Thus, the overall face and back reversing mechanism is large-sized. Although the speed of conveying bank notes can be increased, it is considered that to raise the conveying speed is likely to cause the bank notes to be jammed.
In addition, the face and back reversing mechanism must have the U-turn passage, a guide means such as a blade for allowing any bank note to go in and out the U-turn passage, a drive means for switching the positions taken by the guide means when any bank note goes in and out the U-turn passage, and a conveying means for reversing the travelling direction of any bank note when it goes in and out the U-turn passage. These respective means must sufficiently follow up the travelling of bank notes also when the bank notes to be reversed are successively coming to the U-turn passage. However, they suffer from lack of fast response and stability.
Another face and back reversing mechanism is known other than the mechanism described above, wherein a part of the face and back reversing passage is rotatable by 180.degree. independently of the other parts thereof, and that part is rotated by 180.degree. to reverse the face and back of any bank note when it enters therein.
This modified face and bank reversing mechanism, however, requires a space for rotating the part of the reversing passage by 180.degree.. Thus, it causes the whole of the bank note face and back reversing mechanism to be large-sized and thus requires a large scale rotary mechanism for rotating the reversing passage.